Surgical device for enclosing an internal organ

As medical and hospital costs continue to increase, surgeons are constantly striving to develop advanced surgical techniques. Advances in the surgical field are often related to the development of operative techniques which involve less invasive surgical procedures and reduce overall patient trauma. In this manner, the length of hospital stays can be significantly reduced, and therefore the hospital and medical costs can be reduced as well.

One of the truly great advances in recent years to reduce the invasiveness of surgical procedures is endoscopic surgery. Endoscopic surgery involves the use of an endoscope, which is an instrument permitting the visual inspection and magnification of any cavity of the body. The endoscope is inserted through a cannula after puncture through the wall of the body cavity with a trocar, which is a sharp-pointed instrument. The surgeon can then perform diagnostic and therapeutic procedures at the surgical site with the aid of specialized instrumentation designed to fit through additional cannulas providing openings into the desired body cavity as may be required.

In many surgical procedures, including those involved in endoscopic surgery, it is often necessary to remove bodily tissue or damaged bodily organs. This is especially challenging during endoscopic surgery because of the small openings through which such tissue or organs must be removed. Under these circumstances, it is necessary to fragment, or morcellate, the bodily tissue so that it can be readily removed through the small endoscopic openings.

In response to the need to morcellate and remove bodily tissue during endoscopic surgery, devices have been developed to aid the surgeon. For example, Ison et al., Journal of Medical Engineering and Technology, Vol. 13, No. 6 (Nov./Dec. 1989), pages 285-289, discloses an endoscopic or laparoscopic instrument for removing tissue, referred to in the art as a tissue morcellator, through a small cross-section. An article in General Surgery News, 11 (10) 1990 illustrates the feasibility of laparoscopic nephrectomy which is an endoscopic procedure for excising a kidney, by first enclosing the desired kidney in a nylon drawstring entrapment sack and then using a tissue morcellator to fragment and aspirate the kidney from the sack.

In other endoscopic surgical procedures, it is often necessary or desired to enclose a fractured organ during surgical repair to aid the surgeon in maintaining the integrity of the bodily organ. A device for accomplishing this task is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,428,375. This patent describes a drawstring mesh or net bag for encapsulating a fractured organ during surgical repair. The bag is intended to conform to the organ shape and compress the organ sufficiently to close any organ fractures and provide hemostasis. Similar type devices for enclosing fractured or damaged organs are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,878,890; 2,143,910 and 3,983,863. Unfortunately, none of the devices described in these patents are particularly suitable for endoscopic surgery.

In view of the advances made to date in the field of endoscopic surgery, it would be desirable to fabricate an endoscopic instrument which can perform a variety of functions to enable the surgeon to carry out surgical procedures endoscopically. More specifically, it would be desirable to fabricate an endoscopic device capable of morcellating bodily tissue or organs and to remove such tissue or organs, and to facilitate the surgical repair of fractured organs with an endoscopic device capable of enclosing such fractured organs.

The invention is a medical device for enclosing an internal bodily organ or tissue during surgery. The device comprises a continuous, filamentary strand having a distal noose portion and a proximal free end portion, said free end portion enclosed within a generally rigid longitudinal tubular sleeve so as to facilitate handling of said device; a surgical bag having an open end therein, said bag fixedly attached along substantially the entire perimeter of said open end thereof to said noose portion of said filamentary strand along substantially the entire circumferential length of said noose portion thereof; and means for pulling said free end portion of said filamentary strand proximally so as to continually reduce the diameter of said noose portion thereby continually closing said open end of said surgical bag.

The medical device of this invention is particularly adapted for use during endoscopic surgical techniques. The device can be used during any operative procedure requiring the enclosure of bodily tissue or bodily organs.

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of the medical device of this invention.

FIG. 2 is a perspective view of the medical device on a reduced scale after the device is used to enclose a bodily organ.

FIG. 3 is an enlarged perspective view of the medical device with a portion of said device broken away.

FIG. 4 is an exploded perspective view of the medical device of this invention in combination with conventional endoscopic instruments to facilitate the use of the device during endoscopic surgery.

FIG. 5 is a perspective view illustrating the operation of the medical device of this invention.

FIGS. 6 and 7 are perspective views illustrating the operation of the medical device of this invention within bodily tissue.

As defined in this application, the word "distal" is used to describe that portion of the device which extends away from the user during use, and the word "proximal" is used to describe that portion of the device that extends toward the user during use.

Referring to the Figures, FIG. 1 illustrates a medical device at 10 representing a preferred embodiment of this invention. The device includes a continuous filamentary strand 11 having a distal noose portion 12 and a Proximal free end portion 13. Strand 11 can be Prepared from any conventional surgical suture material, e.g. nylon, silk, steel, catgut, and conventional bioabsorbable suture materials such as polymers and copolymers of lactide, glycolide, para-dioxanone and trimethylene carbonate. Surgical bag 15 having an opening therein for placement of bodily tissue is attached to distal noose portion 12 along substantially the entire perimeter of the open end of the bag by engagement with substantially the entire length of distal noose portion 12. The free end portion 13 of continuous filamentary strand 11 is enclosed within a generally rigid, longitudinal tubular sleeve 14, often referred to in this art as a cannula. Tubular sleeve 14 has a frangible portion 18 at its proximal end and a score line 19 disposed at the distal end of the frangible portion 18. Continuous filamentary strand 11 is adhesively attached within the frangible portion 18 of the tubular sleeve 14 with a conventional adhesive, e.g. epoxy.

As illustrated in more detail at FIG. 3, the noose portion 12 of continuous filamentary strand 11 is sealingly engaged within a channel 20 running along the circumferential length of the open end of the surgical bag 15. In this embodiment, channel 20 is formed by folding the top portion of the bag over about itself and sealed along a lower portion of bag 15 to create a top flap portion 15a. In like manner, bag 15 can also have a peripheral edge seal 24 having a closed bottom portion 15b if a hermetic seal is required for the particular surgical application. Still referring to FIG. 3, the noose portion 12 of continuous filamentary strand 11 is secured with a slip knot 17, which allows movement of the free end portion 13 of the continuous filamentary strand 11 proximally and prevents the noose portion 12 from loosening when engaged about bodily tissue. Longitudinal tubular sleeve 14 has a tapered distal end 16 which prevents slip knot 17 from passing through tubular sleeve 14 during use.

Surgical bag 15 can be constructed of a wide variety of materials, but generally the bag used should be biocompatible and non-toxic to bodily tissue, and should exhibit the requisite conformability so that it can readily fit down a trocar. If the medical device is to be used to morcellate and remove bodily tissue, then the bag is desirably waterproof to prevent fragmented tissue from escaping the bag. Additionally, for this application, the bag should have a high tear and burst resistance, a low modulus and moderate elongation. Although a variety of materials can be used for this purpose, the preferred material of construction for the surgical bag for this application is PEBAX™ block copolyetheramide. Alternatively, if the bag is to be used for encapsulating a fractured organ during surgical repair, then it may be desirable to employ a bag which has a mesh network. See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,428,375, which describes a variety of pliable surgical materials well known in the art for this application that can be fabricated into a desired mesh structure.

Referring now to FIGS. 1 and 2 in combination, one can see generally how the device is used to enclose bodily tissue. In order to encapsulate bodily organ 24, as seen in FIG. 2, the user would first grip frangible portion 18 of tubular sleeve 14 with one hand and the remaining portion of tubular sleeve 14 with the other hand, and then snap apart the two pieces about score line 19. This allows for the continuous filamentary strand 11 to be retracted through the longitudinal tubular sleeve 14 as shown in FIG. 2. Following this simple procedure, the user could then place the surgical bag 15 about a desired bodily organ 24, positioning the bag at the appropriate location about bodily organ 24. To complete the procedure, continuous filamentary strand 11 is pulled proximally as shown by the arrow at FIG. 2, causing the distal noose portion 12 of strand 11 to close the open end of surgical bag 15. As shown more clearly at FIG. 3, knot 17 is restrained by tapered end 16 of the longitudinal tubular sleeve 14 while the user is pulling strand 11 proximally and allows strand 11 to pass through the tubular sleeve 14 so that the distal noose portion 12 may be closed about bodily organ 24. The knot configuration must be such that once the distal noose portion 12 is closed about bodily organ 24, it remains closed and does not loosen.

Referring now to FIG. 4, the medical device of this invention can be used in combination with introducer 21 and trocar 22 to facilitate its use during endoscopic surgery. First, the surgical bag 15 is folded about the axis of the proximal free end portion 13 of continuous filamentary strand 11 so as to facilitate the insertion of the medical device into introducer 21. After the medical device is inserted into introducer 21, the introducer can then be placed within an appropriately sized trocar 22 for insertion into the desired bodily cavity. As shown in FIGS. 5-7, the trocar 22 is introduced into a desired bodily cavity until penetration of the desired bodily tissue 23. As shown in FIG. 7, once the trocar is appropriately placed, the medical device of this invention can be moved distally through introducer 21 and trocar 22 so as to cause surgical bag 15 to protrude from introducer 21 and into bodily tissue 23. Once bag 15 is placed within desired bodily tissue 23 free of the confines of the reducer and trocar, it can unfold as shown by the arrows at FIGS. 5 and 7. After surgical bag 15 unfolds, the user can then manipulate the device so as to place unfolded surgical bag 15 about a desired bodily tissue, and then the user can perform the procedure outlined above to carry out the required operation.

Following the surgical operation, the bag 15 can either be removed from the surgical site or be left intact at the site, depending on the operative procedure performed. For example, if bodily tissue is morcellated within the bag 15, and therefore it becomes necessary to remove the fragmented tissue from the body, then the bag 15 can be readily removed by pulling the tubular sleeve 14 proximally through introducer 21 and trocar 22 until the entire medical device 10, including bag 15, has been removed from the body. Alternatively, if bag 15 is composed of a bioabsorbable surgical mesh, and the bag 15 is used to facilitate the repair of a damaged organ over an extended period of time, it may be desirable to leave bag 15 intact at the surgical site. This can be accomplished simply by first cutting strand 11 at or near the junction of distal noose portion 12 and free end portion 13, and then pulling tubular sleeve 14 proximally so as to remove the free end portion 13 of strand 11 from introducer 21 and trocar 22 while leaving bag 15 intact within the body.

Although only the most preferred surgical device of this invention is described herein, numerous additional embodiments will become apparent to those skilled in this art, all of which are well within the scope and spirit of the claimed invention.